Cruor Effundo
by Reneey Umbra
Summary: Lyn Elumo had imagined her future to be as a teacher. To stay connected with her best friend Reneey, she also continued to obsess over anime. But being kidnapped, sold into slavery, beaten, raped, and forced into prostitution was not on her to do list...


Reneey: So we're like... writing... something depressing. XD

Lyn: Total shock to TASTR fans, right? XD

Reneey: Yeah anyway, this story has suicide, rape, torture, blood, blah blah blah so yeah... fuck off if you don't like.

Lyn: And a very depressing plot. So no read if you're clinically depressed, mkay? Mkay.

Reneey: Yeah and if you do, don't be bitching to us about how you wanna go back to cutting or whatever. YOU READ IT, YOUR FAULT.

Lyn: Okay, I think that covers all content warnings. Oh and we don't own Yu Yu Hakusho so no suing over that, either.

Reneey: Now, let's go write!

---

I didn't weep or break into hysterical tears when the nurses told me that Reneey Umbra, in room 4 of the mental hospital, had committed suicide. No tear even reached my eyes; I had no more left to shed. I didn't even look away when they dragged her out. Instead, I just asked one of the nurses for something to eat -- comfort food, perhaps you would say.

"... Ma'am?" I was so startled by the sound of my own voice that I stopped speaking. I hadn't spoken in days and before that I hadn't really listened to my own voice. Now, though, it was the only sound in the still room and I was struck by how weak and broken it made me seem. It was a far cry from the confident, loud, often sarcastic tone that had been mine when last I had lived in the world of humans.

Shaking off that thought, of the life I had had and what it might have become, I found my voice again and this time didn't flinch at its pathetic fragile whisper: "... Could I... have something to eat...?"

The nurse looked at me strangely. She probably wondered why I hadn't burst into tears for everyone knew how close Reneey and I were but she shrugged and went to the cafeteria for food as I just stayed there, waiting.

When she came back, she had brought a tray with several different types of food on it. Probably she was searching for something I would like and she smiled encouragingly now. Maybe she was just taking it as a good sign that I had finally spoken my first words since they had brought me here. Maybe she took it as a sign the shock of Reneey's death had loosened the hold of catatonia. I let her have that; why should I who had nothing left take anything away from anyone else?

My eyes roamed across the tray, searching. They must have looked almost hungry, I realized, so that probably only helped me out. I tried to call back the gift for earning sympathy I had once had, made my eyes turn sad but apologetic, and asked quietly, "Ma'am? I -- I just wondered... Where I came from, one of my favorites was banana pudding... Do you have anything like that here?"

"Banana pudding?" the nurse repeated as if she wasn't sure she had heard properly. "Well, maybe. I'll go ask the lunch lady, dear."

She smiled sweetly at me and turned on her heel. It was only a few minutes later when she returned with a cup of banana pudding and a plastic spoon. She put it on the tray. "Here you go, dear. Now eat up... It's almost time to go to sleep anyway."

With that, she left me alone in the small, dark room. If I had remembered how to laugh, I would have chuckled at the little clear plastic spoon. Years that felt like lifetimes ago, I had joked about how plastic spoons were sharper than plastic knives; definitely a health hazard in a psychiatric ward. I wasn't going to stab myself with a spoon, though.

Pulling the plastic utensil from the pudding, I moved it to my mouth and let the taste roll over my tongue. How strange that I enjoyed it. I had lied about it being my favorite; actually, I had never tasted banana pudding before. This was largely due to the fact that I was extremely allergic to bananas.

No, I thought as I forced the rest of the pudding down past my rapidly constricting throat, I wouldn't need to stab myself with a plastic spoon. Leave that for someone with less imagination. This was my justice; this was my reward.

Everything I knew was gone. There was no purpose for me in living on without it.


End file.
